3D-Printed Gun & Free Speech

[Sparko]

People who don't know anything about guns are usually the ones who are the most upset about them. They act like someone gave away the secret to making a nuclear bomb at home.

Guns are really simple. All you really need is a tube to hold the cartridge and guide the bullet and a metal pin (like a nail) to hit the back of the cartridge and set off the cap. The rest of the 'gun' is just fancy ways to make it safer and easier to use.

Here is an animation of how the 3D gun works.

[Cow Poke]

And if you act within the next 24 hours you'll also receive our plans for a 3-D printed bayonet including plans for a lug so you can attach it to your 3-D printed handgun at now extra charge.

And for only $20 more, we'll RUSH this to your house in time for supper!

[Sparko]

This doesn't seem suspicious or like a setup at all...

Owner of 3D-printed gun company wanted on sexual assault charge
Police said that Cody Wilson's last known location is in Taiwan.



Cody Wilson, owner of Defense Distributed and at the center of lawsuits over the ability to sell plans for 3D-printed guns online, is now wanted by the US Marshals. Wilson has been charged with sexually assaulting a child in Texas, and Austin Police have said that his last known location is in Taipei, Taiwan.

Wilson is accused of committing the sexual assault on a 16 year old in an Austin hotel on August 15th and paying her $500, after the two started talking on SugarDaddyMeet.com where he used the name "Sanjuro." Police said that he identified himself to the girl, and that surveillance footage from the hotel shows them together.

During a press conference, the Austin Police said that Wilson had missed a planned flight back from Taiwan, and that they are putting together plans to arrest him if he does not come back and surrender. Last month Wilson said he would sell plans for the guns via his website and deliver them via email, USB stick or other file transfer methods, despite the efforts of state attorneys to stop him.

https://www.engadget.com/2018/09/19/...d-printed-gun/

[seer]

People who don't know anything about guns are usually the ones who are the most upset about them. They act like someone gave away the secret to making a nuclear bomb at home.

Heck when we were kids we used to make 22 cal. zip guns...

[Terraceth]

Sort of like how everybody freaked out after one person died from a self driving car, even though millions have died from human operated cars.

You have to go over a lot of years to get to the "millions" count, though. For example, over 3.5 million people have been killed due to human operated cars in the US... from 1899 to 2013. That's more than a century.

A more plausible number to point out is that there are over 30,000 deaths per year in the United States from human operated cars. However, the thing is, there's a lot more human operated cars than self driving cars, so I don't think trying to compare the number of accidents is all that fair.

[Cow Poke]

You have to go over a lot of years to get to the "millions" count, though. For example, over 3.5 million people have been killed due to human operated cars in the US... from 1899 to 2013. That's more than a century.

A more plausible number to point out is that there are over 30,000 deaths per year in the United States from human operated cars. However, the thing is, there's a lot more human operated cars than self driving cars, so I don't think trying to compare the number of accidents is all that fair.

Perhaps a better comparison would be to look at how many of the "self driving" cars ended up in an accident that clearly could have been prevented had a human been in control. (but, then again, self driving cars are not as likely to fall asleep, get drunk or high, or be preoccupied on a cell phone)

[Leonhard]

A lot of those recipes are absolute junk resulting in something that'll only result in a bunch of smoke and fizzing. Some are downright dangerous to those who follow them. I remember one that confused potassium nitrate and potassium nitrite. If followed it would likely explode in your face.

Sure some of them are dangerous. A person who sets out to make nitroglycerin is more likely to blow himself up than anyone else. Which works as a handy filter. But I think you're somewhat overestimating the difficulty of making explosives. There's a lot of things that will either outright explode, or conflagrate with enough of a force to kill people. The Unabomber managed to kill several using ordinary fireworks type conflagrating explosives.

Setting out to create c4 or tnt is chemically involved enough that I doubt anyone other than a dedicated group of people with some expertize within chemistry could pull it off. At least if we're talking synthesing more than small quantities and vasting vast quantities of other chemicals in the process.

If you're a farmer you have access to enough fertilizer. Load up a semi-truck with petrol soaked fertilizer and a small cord detonator, park it infront of the whitehouse and set it off. The resulting shockwave would be powerful enough to blow down that age old building.

Breivik, that alt-right terrorist, who killed over a hundred people, created several of those bombs, using nothing more than designs from the internet.

Of course, no one is going to be allowed to drive a mysterious semi close to the White House or the Capitol without being investigated I imagine.

[oxmixmudd]

People who don't know anything about guns are usually the ones who are the most upset about them. They act like someone gave away the secret to making a nuclear bomb at home.

Guns are really simple. All you really need is a tube to hold the cartridge and guide the bullet and a metal pin (like a nail) to hit the back of the cartridge and set off the cap. The rest of the 'gun' is just fancy ways to make it safer and easier to use.

Here is an animation of how the 3D gun works.

The issue is not how it works. It is the capability for anyone to produce a gun out of materials that are not detectable with metal detectors. It also gives anyone the capability of creating a handgun for themselves without going through any third party, seriously reducing the tracibility of such a weapon if used in a crime.


Jim

[rogue06]

Sure some of them are dangerous. A person who sets out to make nitroglycerin is more likely to blow himself up than anyone else. Which works as a handy filter. But I think you're somewhat overestimating the difficulty of making explosives. There's a lot of things that will either outright explode, or conflagrate with enough of a force to kill people. The Unabomber managed to kill several using ordinary fireworks type conflagrating explosives.

If you knew me you would have realized I nearly fell off the chair laughing at the bolded comment. I can walk into virtually in home and make high explosives from what is in there. I have collected on bets on the claim that I can make water explode (without adding anything to it -- just water)^[1]. So no, I realize that for those who know how it is mind-blowingly easy to do so. My point is that there is a lot of dangerous junk out on the internet or published in books like the Anarchist Cookbook not that it is difficult to make explosives.






1. Every year, prior to 9/11, I made a "firecracker" and would set it off at a quarry for the Fourth of July or at the start of New Years. This "firecracker" was often enough homemade C-4 or other similar explosive to level a four bedroom house. That is not an exaggeration. The challenge for me was to come up with a new means of detonating it and I'd rotate between improvised electrical, chemical or mechanical devices (the latter was the only real challenge since after several years I found myself occasionally doing a variation on a theme).

[rogue06]

The issue is not how it works. It is the capability for anyone to produce a gun out of materials that are not detectable with metal detectors. It also gives anyone the capability of creating a handgun for themselves without going through any third party, seriously reducing the tracibility of such a weapon if used in a crime.


Jim

It is absurdly easy to make a firearm now, including full automatic ones. I have even discussed a few of the methods employed in the past.

[oxmixmudd]

It is absurdly easy to make a firearm now, including full automatic ones. I have even discussed a few of the methods employed in the past.

And now it is even easier. With that added 'benefit' that the design has been tested, very little skill is required (other than how to run the printer itself) and I can make as many of them as are needed once I have the printer. And I can make them out of materials that can be difficult to detect. So yes, it does enlarge the problem space. And yes, it does present new problems for law enforcement.


Jim

[rogue06]

And now it is even easier. With that added 'benefit' that the design has been tested, very little skill is required (other than how to run the printer itself) and I can make as many of them as are needed once I have the printer. And I can make them out of materials that can be difficult to detect. So yes, it does enlarge the problem space. And yes, it does present new problems for law enforcement.


Jim

You used far less expensive equipment in the methods I'm familiar with and anyone who took a shop class working with metal in school could do them.

[oxmixmudd]

You used far less expensive equipment in the methods I'm familiar with and anyone who took a shop class working with metal in school could do them.

So. You are convinced that the capacity to create these guns - plug and play - as many of them as you want - creates no additional security risk than what is already out there?

I think you are minimizing the risk. Indeed - 'working with metal'. With the printer they are plastics which can't be detected by metal detectors.

Though the reality is as 3D printers become more and more powerful, it will be next to impossible to stop someone determined to create a weapon using them from creating it. Right now cost is a factor. That will change. Eventually, if there is not some sort of big brother looking at what is being created on what printer, there will be no way to control misuse of them. And even then, the software that talks back to big brother can be hacked.

I don't think that is an excuse not to try to reduce misuse. I would not be at all surprised to see implementation of safeguards by the manufacturers of the printers that enable tracibility to items printed by them.

And who knows, maybe with advancements in AI the printer itself might be able to detect it is being used to create a weapon and notify authorities and/or refuse to create the project.

Jim

[rogue06]

So. You are convinced that the capacity to create these guns - plug and play - as many of them as you want - creates no additional security risk than what is already out there?

I think you are minimizing the risk.

Though the reality is as 3D printers become more and more powerful, it will be next to impossible to stop someone determined to create a weapon using them from creating it. Right now cost is a factor. That will change. Eventually, if there is not some sort of big brother looking at what is being created on what printer, there will be no way to control misuse of them. And even then, the software that talks back to big brother can be hacked.

I don't think that is an excuse not to try to reduce misuse. I would not be at all surprised to see implementation of safeguards by the manufacturers of the printers that enable tracibility to items printed by them.

Jim

Presently I think the concerns surrounding these particular guns is a bit overblown.

[oxmixmudd]

Presently I think the concerns surrounding these particular guns is a bit overblown.

I know. That is why I'm trying to make the case it is a problem. And a problem that will grow, not diminish, over time. They are not limited to just making 1 or 2 shot handguns.


Jim